Teams to reduce number of foreign players on rosters

On Aug. 31, teams in the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL) are required to name which three foreign players they will keep on their starting roster for the remainder of the season.

Either the Elephants and Lions are likely to take the second-half title, earning the right to face the Sinon Bulls, the first-half champs, in the post season.

The league-leading Brother Elephants' skipper Lin Yi-tseng (林易增) has some tough choices to make, as all four of his foreign players are performing at or near peak level in each of their respective positions.

Former Nippon Professional Baseball League pitching star Yokota Hisanori has a league-high 14 victories, 2.64 ERA, and 128 strikeouts.

Panamanian native Miguel Martinez has a 1.78 ERA in the eight games that he has pitched.

Despite a couple of off games, American veteran Jonathan Hurst deserves to stay on the team for his post season experience, not to mention his 10-3 record and the two 16-win seasons with the Elephants prior to his rejoining the CPBL this year.

Finally, Japanese starter Nakagomi Sin is 8-8, with a 2.97 ERA. But given the fact that most of Nakagomi's eight losses came during the early part of the season when the Elephant offense was literally non-existent and his ERA is the eighth best in the league among active pitchers, Lin really may like to have someone like Nakagomi to bolster the team's weak relief pitching.

For the President Lions, former major leaguer John Frascatore has more than proven his worth by holding the opposition to less than one earned run per game in his past five outings. Dominican sensation Jose Parra, meanwhile, has a ridiculously low ERA of 0.91 in the seven games that he has pitched so far.

Team manager Hsieh Chang-hehn (謝長亨) will most likely have to decide between American right-hander John Burgos (5-4 with a 2.76 ERA in 10 games), who has amassed 48 wins in the past three seasons with the Lions, and Japanese second baseman Yoshimi Hiroaki, whose stellar defensive skills and .339 batting average (fourth best in the league) would be sorely missed.

Round Up

The Elephants blanked the First Securities Agan 4-0 on Monday in their last meeting of the season. The loss by the Agan put them winless for the year in 20 tries against the Elephants.

Reserve starter Liu Wen-mao (劉文貿) got a rare call from manager Lin Yi-tseng to take the mound and responded with a win after allowing only four hits in six scoreless innings before turning the game over to reliever Wang Ching-li (王勁力).

Tuesday's four-all tie between the Makoto Gida and the Bulls in Taichung ended the Gida's two-game losing skid, but did nothing to help with their miserable nine-game winless streak.

The Gida took a 4-1 lead into the sixth, but yielded a critical two-run shot to Bulls veteran Huang Chung-yi (黃忠義).

Upcoming Games

The Bulls will finish the series against the Gida in Kaohsiung today and in Pingtung on Saturday. These two games are must wins for the Bulls if they wish to remain in the hunt for the second-half title.

The Elephants visit the Whales in Hsinchuang last night and today before Sunday's series finale in Tienmu.

The Lions host the Agan in Tainan for three games starting yesterday and continuing today and Sunday. The Agan will be playing for pride since they have practically been eliminated from the post season play.